TORY leader David Cameron was grilled by voters at a question time session in Brighouse last night.

The hour-long ‘Cameron Direct’ session saw the Conservative leader fielding questions from members of the public at Brighouse High School.

The session was originally planned for last February but was postponed when Mr Cameron’s son Ivan died.

The Calder Valley seat is one of several key marginals in West Yorkshire including the Colne Valley and Dewsbury seats. All three are currently slim Labour majorities.

Mr Cameron told the audience: "You are some of the key people who will determine the outcome of the next election and I think you have every right to see one of the people who thinks he ought to be Prime Minister, put your question, hear the answer and see what you think."

Following comments last week by Tory MEP Daniel Hannan that the NHS was a "60-year mistake" Mr Cameron moved quickly to assure the audience that he backed the health service. He said: "I profoundly believe in the NHS. It’s a great thing and has done incredible things for my family."

On the credit crunch Mr Cameron branded the Labour Party as "wreckless".He said there was always likely to be a boom and bust cycle but the Conservative Party would have managed things better, starting with stronger regulation.

He also admitted if elected he would cut public expenditure but gave his "cast iron guarantee" that he would protect the NHS.

On the MPs’ expenses scandal he said: "You are all owed an apology. It’s our responsibility to clean up the expenses system."

Mr Cameron said he believed every claim should be published on the internet and added that the salaries of all public sector workers who earned more than £150,000 and the details of all public sector projects costing £25,000 or more, should also be published online.

One questioner asked Mr Cameron what he was going to do about illegal immigrants that were "bleeding us dry".

He said: "A lot of them have brought a huge amount to this country. They were welcome in the past and they should be welcome in the future.

"But the first thing to do is to secure our borders...we would introduce some sort of border police."

Mr Cameron also said there should be some sort of limit on immigration especially for countries that were new joiners to the European Union.